Homebrew

I hadn't been keeping up with this thread for a while until Phatsacks contacted me. Since I've caught back up a little, I thought I should make some comments. Phatsacks's monitor we did just like mine. We discussed the other methods and that method is what Phatsacks decided upon. In retrospect, we should have done his with the following transmission angles BEF ==, BEF l l, DBEF == as opposed to my BEF l l, BEF ==, DBEF l l. There seems to be much confusion over my method. I see it had strange results for some. I thought I had mentioned my reasons for the way I oriented the films, but it looks like I forgot.

First thing I want to make clear is that I'm, by no means, an expert on displays, lcds, or vikuiti films. I'm actually shocked as many people followed my notes considering how disappointed I was with my results(which could very well be because of a mistake on my part). Anyone that has kept up with the thread during the course of my upgrade would also note I made many mistakes, which I did try to correct. Though I made many mistakes in the process of doing my screen, I chose to keep the BEF l l, BEF ==, DBEF l l orientations in an effort to keep the up/down viewing angle better since my screen is mounted low on my dash. For most people it would likely be better to do BEF ==, BEF l l, DBEF == since the side to side viewing angle is more important for most people.

I think there's still some mass confusion regarding polarizers. Admittedly I don't know what part of the lcd is the polarizer and I suspect many others don't(Though I do realize DBEF is a polarizer). That could be one of the larger problems many are having. After some reading, I'm led to believe that the polarizer in question is adhered to the back of the lcd panel itself. I'm not sure if this is correct however. If thats the case, then checking the orientation of the polarizer could be difficult. I think we need to nail down where the rearmost polarizer is in our LCD's is for sure and nail down the best method for determining it's orientation. Also we've been recommending orienting the DBEF the same direction as the FIRST piece of BEFII rather than the polarizer. I think early on we misunderstood what the DBEF instructions meant. This could be why Nobb had such a bad result with my method. May his polarizer is horizontal and thus having the DBEF vertically oriented oriinally conflicted with that. It may be that the 2nd piece of BEFII had nothing to do with it, rather the orientation of the DBEF. Or maybe that wasn't the case either. I think we still have some fine tuning still to do with this upgrade method.

-Kevin

MP3Car.com

 

Phatsacks

I wanted to add real fast that the pics we took before and after were actually on the LOWEST brightness setting.

I was playing with the buttons on the right hand side, and there was about six brightness settings. It was very nice once on the 3rd level (I guess 4 if you count the default 1).

Anxious to test again tomorrow.

nobb

Hey Homebrew, thanks for the clarification. Are you sure the LCD panel itself is polarized? I would have thought that the only polarization done is via the films (which I removed all of, and replaced with the 3M ones), and the job of the LCD was mainly to block and unblock pixels of light accordingly. What worked for you didnt work for me, and what worked for me might not work for you, so this was a pretty confusing upgrade.

I am actually really surprised at how viewable Phatsacks's monitor looks in the sun using the || = || method (my monitor was almost unviewable in any sun in that arrangement). Only by setting up the films in a = || = arrangement do I obtain results similar to those pictures. This is just my observation and I have no idea why this is the way it is.

Phatsacks

Homebrew and I were just discussing this.

If he and his research is correct, the polarizer on your screen may be oriented opposite of mine, thus you would have to arrange it = || =

Homebrew

Based on my research, there's a film glued on each side of the actual lcd panel when it's built. What I've read states that lcd's don't work without this polarizer. The film on the back of the lcd(closest to the backlight) is a polarizer. I discovered this after finding some sites on making lcd projectors out of these style lcd's. There are numerous references to people trying to remove built in anti-reflective films and damaging or removing the polarizer thus rendering the lcd useless. I need to get into a screen to take a look at this, but all my research indicates this. The polarizer isn't meant to be removed/removable so it may be hard to see it and furthermore it's orientation. I seen a picture of an lcd with it's polarizer pulled back halfway so I know they do exist on at least some LCD's. My research indicates that all LCD's use them though. My theory is that's why my orientations didn't work for you. You're polarizer may go the opposite direction. So are you using 1 or 2 sheets of BEF? I though you removed one sheet and changed the DBEF orientation to end up with BEF == DBEF ==. Also for clarification which DBEF are you using? DBEF-II, DBEF-E, etc. Also 0 degreee or 45 degree DBEF? Sorry if I missed this info some where. I think we're making progress, we just need to iron out a few wrinkles in our process(es). We also need to keep track of what everyone uses and their results/opinions. I really think the ESR is a big contributor to Phatsacks results.

-Kevin

nobb

Initially, I tried the configuration BEFII || DBEF ||, which didnt work out, so then I tried BEFII || BEF II = DBEF || which also didnt work out. My final configuration is BEFII = and DBEF =. I am only using one BEFII sheet because I didnt want to hurt horizontal viewing angle. I am using the DBEF-E sheet. Phatsacks results do seem to look better than mine maybe because he used the ESR. I didnt feel confident lifting out the backlight module (very difficult on my monitor) to put in the ESR, so I left that out.

From my understanding, LCDs work by having the individual pixels change polarization when applied with an electric current. This would explain why the LCD module itself has another polarizer. The light would first be polarized by the polarizer, then based on the polarization of the pixels, the light would either pass or not. So I am thinking that the reason DBEF enhances brightness is because it recycles light that is not of the same polarization as the LCD module polarizer. The recycled light would have normally been absorbed by the LCD polarizer, so I guess this is what 3m means when they say the DBEF gives light a second chance.

If there exists some type of thin film that acts as a one way mirror, then we placed that film behind the LCD module (but in front of the backlight), wouldnt we basically have a transreflective? Take a look at this thin film that is applied to windows (one side is transmissive, other is reflective):
http://cgi.ebay.nl/One-Way-Mirror-Wi...QQcmdZViewItem
Could the application of this film act as a transreflective upgrade?

In regards to determining the polarization of the LCD module itself, couldnt people shine a light directly from behind the module and use a polarizing filter from a calculator (or something with a common monochrome lcd screen) to determine the transmission axis for the polarizer in the LCD module? I am not sure how to determine the transmission axis for the calculator's polarizing filter, but perhaps they are all polarized the same direction with respect to the calculators screen.

Homebrew

Thats pretty much what I've concluded as well from my reading.


I'm still a little confused on alot of this stuff, through my reading I saw many different types of lcd polarizer setups. Transmissive, Transflective, Reflective, etc. It's all above my head. I don't know exactly how the transflective upgrades we currently have available are performed, but my reading led me to the conclusion that in true transflective displays, it's the polarizer adhered to the lcd panel that also has an attached transflective layer. Based on that, I would say a true transflective upgrade would involve removing the adhered polarizer from the lcd panel and adhering a transflective polarizer in it's place.


Sounds like a good place to start. It may turn out easy to determine this, who knows. I won't be taking mine back apart any time soon, so I won't be much help on this front.

-Kevin

Guinnessdawg

I have an extra spare parts 8" lilli...when I get the chance, I'll look to see if a layer can be removed. The DEBF I purchased off EBAY is the P2. If I can get the layer your referring to off, I'll put it in place of my live one and see if there's any change. I haven't bought my BEF from digikey yet (....was turned down for samples).

__________________
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Pentium III
601mhz, 288gb RAM
60gb hard drive @7800 RPM (upgraded from 5gb!)
nlited Windows XP pro
Gateway Solo 2150 laptop
power switch extended
8" Lilli molded in-dash


project 75% complete

Homebrew

Be warned, removing the polarizer without replacing it will render the lcd useless. I wasn't actually recommending anyone attempt to replace the polarizer, just stating what I thought would constitute at least part of a true transflective upgrade

-Kevin

nobb

Why remove the built in polarizer in the LCD module? Is there some sort of transreflective polarizer you can replace that with or something? Does anyone know what would happen if I put a one way mirror film in my LCD screen such that it will be backlight module > BEFII = > DBEF = > One way mirror film > LCD Module. The mirror film would allow light from the backlight to escpape, but reflect incoming sunlight back out through the LCD module. Is there any problem with my theory? I might be able to obtain samples of these thin one way mirror films, but I dont know if it will be worth my effort to put it in.

Homebrew

I'm really not sure what effect that will have, but thats partially what ESR does. Reflects incoming light back out to improve brightness. Basically it recycles the sunlight thats washing out your view and uses it to improve the screen's brightness.

-Kevin

Mojo85

what films did you guys use? and ARM? ARM is highly recomended by 3M to reduce glare.

Homebrew

ESR-BEFII-BEFII-DBEF-II 0 degree. He had ARMR-200 but I'm not sure that he went through with putting it on. It was kinda think and we were afraid it was going to decrease touchscreen sensitivity. He said he was going to mess with the ARM when he got home, so I don't know if he did for sure or not. I'll let him chime in. I suspect he left it off though because of the difficulty he was having trying to apply it.

cpsubrian

Hey Guys,

I just wanted to add my 2 pennies. I am just barely getting into the carputer scene and have loved this thread as I have been struggling, like many others, on how much to spend on the screen.

Anyhow, prior to getting into this carputer scene I have built two DIY projectors and have taken apart three LCDS for those projects. I can confirm from experience and from lots of reading on the topic that LCD do have polarizers and antiglare on the screen itself, as well as in sheets behind the screen. For the projector community, we remove the anti-glare in order to increase light transmission. People have also removed the factory polars and replaced them with higher transmission polars.

Here is what I think may work for us. I think we could removed any anti-glare on the lcd itself and then add an anti-glare to the touchscreen. This way we are removing a layer before adding a layer.

I will be making my screen purchase soon (more and more tempting to go with a cheaper one, after reading this thread) and if I do decide to upgrade myself instead of pay $700 then I will definitely keep you all posted on my progress.

Phatsacks

It was worthless. The thickness of the film made the application too difficult to squeegee the bubbles out.

I'm considering having a custom protector made from bestkinsever.com (not for anti-reflection).

When I was buying everything, I kept browsing the classifieds, and about half the screens had "a small scratch" on them. So it seems like a very good chance that I will scratch this screen.

I highly recommend against buying the ARMR-200 film.

MP3Car.com